Richard Barker Quotes in Topsy-Turvy (1999)

[giving notes after a dress rehearsal]

Gilbert: Your performances were, on the whole, promising, which is more than can be said, alas, for that of the sliding doors. One of which might have thought it was in Japan, but the other was apparently stubbornly laboring under the misapprehension that it was on holiday in Yorkshire.

[laughter]

Richard Barker: Where was the man, Mr. Seymour?

Mr. Seymour, Production Manager: Rest assured, Mr. Barker, that tomorrow night he will be with us in Japan.

Gilbert: Barker, what are you doing? Do you propose to join in?

Richard Barker: My dancing days are long over, Mr. Gilbert.

Gilbert: Over, Barker, but not forgotten.

Richard D'Oyly Carte: Who told you that?

Richard Barker: Hollingshead. I played a game of cricket with him this morning before breakfast at Coram's Fields.

Helen Lenoir: In this heat?

Richard Barker: Yes, madam, but not in this attire.

Helen Lenoir: Oh, good.

[Barker phones Gilbert with the returns from the previous evening, speaking in code]

Richard Barker: U, U, plus 10 shillings and sixpence!

Gilbert: Can you repeat that, please?

Richard Barker: Yes: U, U!

Gilbert: So that's U for udder, U for udder, plus ten shillings and sixpence!

Richard Barker: Yes!

Gilbert: So you have two udders, Barker?

Richard Barker: Uh, yes!

Gilbert: I always suspected as much!

Richard Barker: [laughs]

Richard Barker: [during a heat wave] Seven dead horses in the Strand this morning. Well, one down by Trafalgar Square.

Richard D'Oyly Carte: I don't know how you can sit there in your hat and coat, Barker.

Richard Barker: I'm too hot to remove them, Mr. Carte.

Helen Lenoir: [during a heat wave] I fear we shall all have to pray for rain.

Richard Barker: Well, if it's any consolation, every theatre in town is afflicted. Even the Gaiety, graced as it is with Madame Bernhardt's execrable Lady Macbeth.

Richard Barker: And now, sir, I am going in search of some Italian hokey-pokey, and I care not who knows it.

Richard Barker: [during a heat wave] I'm going out to seek a little Italian hokey-pokey, and I care not who knows it.

Richard D'Oyly Carte: Thank you, Barker.

Richard Barker: I shall not return with any for you sir... because it would melt. Au revoir.